Member-only story
Rolling Around on the Floor, Laughing, Laughing, Laughing
When the floodgates of Divine humor open up unexpectedly
When I was 13, living in the suburbs of New York, there were three things I wanted to be when I grew up: a major league baseball player, a writer, and much taller.
At no time during my adolescence did I ever once dream of becoming a modern-day monk. But at the age of 30, that became my aspiration.
Coming out of a failed marriage and being disillusioned with the world, I found myself on the cusp of taking a lifetime vow of renunciation and entering into one of Prem Rawat’s ashrams — not exactly the future my parents had envisioned for me.
Back then, the process for moving into an ashram was a simple one — get together with like-minded people of the same gender, rent a place, and begin living the ashram lifestyle as best we understood. Then, soon after, one of Prem’s instructors would visit and make sure we understood what we were getting into.
So that’s what I did. I rented an apartment on Adams Street, found six friends with the same aspiration, and moved in.
